Free Will Debate

[brewer]

Free will cannot exist absolutely unless one is willing to say that all epileptics are choosing to have their seizures or that Alzheimer's patients are choosing to forget the names of their grandchildren.

This is absolutely silly.

[The Grand Nudger]

@ Brian.

We all qualify as outside frames of reference for each other. It actually should be pretty easy to demonstrate this free will business. The trouble is that when we go looking we find predisposition, circumstance, hard wiring, and conditioned response.

The space for free will, if it does exist in the human animal, seems exceedingly small.

[Duty]

Adults (and, to a lesser degree children IMO) need be held responsible for our actions, including by ourselves, or else bad behaviour would doubtless run riot like wildfire and society as we know it would descend into total anarchy. Is there free will? Probably not, unless there's some voodoo magic sky leprechaun pulling the strings of existence. That in no way affects the first sentence of this post however. Is it the apotheosis of irony that we rational atheistic ground apes need "live this lie?" Almost certainly. Laughter...that's the answer. Have a nice day.

[The Grand Nudger]

Not having a free will doesn’t prevent us from holding people accountable. Nor do we need to live the lie to do so. Frankly, a better understanding of human behavior…say…in the case of incompetents, has helped us to hold people accountable in ways that aren’t pure punitive vengeance seeking.

We may fine a person for stealing a loaf of bread when they’re starving….but we don’t cut off their hands. It won’t stop them from committing another crime of desperation anyway.

The fantasy of crime being an issue of bad people freely willing this or that has been a disaster, historically speaking.

[Jehanne]

Free will cannot exist absolutely unless one is willing to say that all epileptics are choosing to have their seizures or that Alzheimer's patients are choosing to forget the names of their grandchildren.

This is absolutely silly.

Why?

[brewer]

This is absolutely silly.

Why?

Because epilepsy and dementia are disease/disorder states, independent of conscious thought. Could you argue that there is no absolute free will because of metastatic brain cancer? It effects the brain also.

[Neo-Scholastic]

It's free will when I make the choice and it is determinism when the choice was not mine. Once I figure out who I am, that first sentence will make sense.

[Anomalocaris]

This is absolutely silly.

Why?

free will is not omnipotent will.    Is an epileptic free to will him/herself to stop having seizures even if such will does not actually affect his/her actual seizures?   If so, then that implies room for free will without implying the will found within is actually free.

[BrianSoddingBoru4]

@ Brian.

We all qualify as outside frames of reference for each other.  It actually should be pretty easy to demonstrate this free will business.  The trouble is that when we go looking we find predisposition, circumstance, hard wiring, and conditioned response.

The space for free will, if it does exist in the human animal, seems exceedingly small.

But we’re all in the same frame of reference regarding the Does-free-will-exist question. Expecting that to determine the answers is like expecting the rats in a maze to have a confab as to the meaning of the experiment. It’s not possible for us to determine if we’re even in the maze at all. It would take a rat standing outside the maze to make that realization.

Boru

[Jehanne]

@ Brian.

We all qualify as outside frames of reference for each other.  It actually should be pretty easy to demonstrate this free will business.  The trouble is that when we go looking we find predisposition, circumstance, hard wiring, and conditioned response.

The space for free will, if it does exist in the human animal, seems exceedingly small.

But we’re all in the same frame of reference regarding the Does-free-will-exist question. Expecting that to determine the answers is like expecting the rats in a maze to have a confab as to the meaning of the experiment. It’s not possible for us to determine if we’re even in the maze at all. It would take a rat standing outside the maze to make that realization.

Boru

They are actually aware of what is going on:

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edward_C._Tolman